Beauty Redefined has done it again. I'm right on board with this idea of not complimenting someone on how much weight they have lost (unless they bring it up). I know from personal experience how even one comment can send a person on that dangerous pathway of weight and food obsession. In fact, it doesn't even have to be a comment about my weight that does it to me. All it takes is for someone to say that I should/could eat healthier, or that I would feel so much better if I just exercised, or for me to just participate in a conversation about healthy foods and exercise. See, to my brain, healthy food = "good" food = food that won't make you fat. If I'm eating something that could be considered "bad", then that must mean I'm fat, and if I keep eating it, I'm just going to get fatter. And I can't be fat, because what will people think about me? I'm nothing if I'm not skinny. And then I look in the mirror. And I see I'm not skinny. And I hate myself. Everything I've accomplished flies right out the window. I'm not a certified Master Herbalist, I'm fat. I'm not a good mother because my thighs rub together. Why does it matter that I can crochet if my stomach isn't flat? The number of books I've read and the insane amount of random trivia and useless facts I know doesn't matter if I jiggle anywhere. And I honestly can't think of any other accomplishments because now my mind is filled with shame that I'm not skinny anymore. And I'm not putting shame in quotes because I am ashamed. I'm ashamed at failing the one thing that society tells me is the most important thing for me to accomplish: to be skinny enough that I'm a pleasure to look at. The Man's opinion is irrelevant, I have to be approved of by that faceless "society". And I was very good at that for close to 10 years. There is a part of me that hates myself for giving that up so "easily" (that's in quotes because it wasn't). I can't seem to remind that part of me how miserable I was when I was doing everything I could to keep losing weight. How I actually had a friend hug me for eating two slices of pizza. How my nutritionist had to convince me that it was okay to at least drink some Kool-aid to keep my blood sugar up if I wasn't going to eat anything and how horrified I was about it. About how I thought I couldn't buy food because it was a waste of money. How I couldn't ask to stop for food if I was out with friends and was hungry because that meant I was weaker than them, even if I hadn't eaten all day. How I cried one day because I was looking in the mirror and inhaled and instantly "felt" fatter because my ribs expanded. About how my heart hurt sometimes, how I couldn't walk very far without getting winded, how easily I bruised, how I couldn't eat even if I wanted to without permission from someone else. How completely controlled I was by my eating disorder and that damn number on the scale. Nope, what I remember is how many compliments I got on my looks. How many times I heard some other woman lament that she wasn't as skinny as me. That she wished she has my "self-control", or if they knew about the anorexia, that they wished they had it "just a little bit". How I was lucky that I could wear whatever I wanted. How it was because of how skinny I was that guys talked to me, since guys won't talk to "fat" girls. Even though those guys DID talk to those girls. And the worst was hearing from my friends that they hated me because I was so skinny.
THAT is what I consider my biggest accomplishment. And it makes me sick.
